Celebration of film pioneer

A special plaque will be unveiled to celebrate the cinema pioneer internationally recognised for filming the world’s first moving images in Leeds.

Louis Le Prince conducted his groundbreaking work in Leeds in 1888. He filmed two moving picture sequences: ‘Roundhay Garden Scene’, shot at Oakwood Grange and believed to be the oldest surviving film in existence, and a Leeds Bridge street scene, using his single-lens camera.

A plaque, originally on the site of Le Prince’s former workshop in Leeds, will be reinstated at its original home of Broadcasting Place, part of Leeds Beckett’s city campus, on November 2. A celebrity guest from Leeds International Film Festival will unveil the plaque.

A free exhibition of images and artefacts related to Louis Le Prince and to his years in Leeds will then be officially opened by Laurie Snyder, a descendant of Le Prince, at Leeds Central Library. The exhibition will be free and open to the public from November 2 to 16.

Professor Robert Shail, of Leeds Beckett University, said: “It’s thrilling to bring back the original Louis Le Prince plaque to its home at the site of his former workshop. Le Prince was a pioneer who helped to make cinema possible.”